New voices might ask impertinent questions like, “who are the customers and how do we really know what they want?” Better to bring in the usual experts who claim to speak for readers and advertisers. That way nobody has to waste time listening to the hoi polloi (the long tail of readers and advertisers) before they start their redesign.

Too many voices can get overwhelming. Of course, if they don’t listen to those new voices, they run the risk of missing the changes and being out of business.

Mainstream media really needs to focus on their strengths. By having a paid staff, who can spend TIME researching, they have the ability to be the sources of authoritative information. MSM has the opportunity to be the people who delve further into issues and root out facts (theoretically, that’s what they’ve been doing). Bloggers tend to be folks with a specific expertise, and also other jobs that keep them from reading far and obscure sources of info. MSM should be, if they choose to step up (and some will, I’m sure) and provide true depth. Ironically, bloggers should be viewed, in this model, as key partners. Those much derided blogs provide the direction to find depth, insights that “common sense” might not bring to light.

MSM has a place in the new information economy; they just need to quit whining about it and start working.

Better to be a liberal and a jackass than to be just a dumbass.

Throw us a bone, oh wizened one.
First off, who are you insulting?
Second, how about some evidence?
Third, how about remembering that casual readers don’t want to follow minutiae?

Nothing is wrong with truth, but handling is a different “shippers” fault i guess.

You can understand their reluctance about allowing many new voices can’t you?

New voices might ask impertinent questions like, “who are the customers and how do we really know what they want?” Better to bring in the usual experts who claim to speak for readers and advertisers. That way nobody has to waste time listening to the hoi polloi (the long tail of readers and advertisers) before they start their redesign.

>> are all from the big companies and the old ways.

I take it you didn’t read *all* the names here.

Bob Wyman and Rich Skrenta are neither from big companies nor “the old ways” last time I checked.

Certainly, there’s a lot of representation here from main stream media — but I’d argue PubSub and Topix.net are a good start towards inclusion of new models and thought here.

We might not be your NYC-dwelling-Michael’s-dining-uber-blogger sort of online riffraff, but throw us a bone here

Chris Tolles
VP Marketing
Topix.net

R2K..Bathrooms..Rocketry